Champions of Aincrad and Middle Earth
by Forever hero girl
Summary: SAO has been defeated, Kirito and Asuna are supposed to be dead, but are they? Upon waking up in Middle Earth, Kirito must find his friends, his way home, the truth behind SAO and Alfheim, and all while helping to save Middle Earth from the destruction the One Ring would bring should it fall into enemy hands. Are they ever going to get to go home again? Read and review. :)


**Okay, so this is a rewrite of Sword Art Online's Champion in Middle Earth. The original one I wrote really** _ **really**_ **quickly, and I realized I had a lot of missed potential in the story. The original story only covered the first movie, Fellowship of the Ring, so here's that and the other two movies will be soon.**

 **Hopefully this one will be far better with the extra content and the changes I made to both the Sword Art Online Anime as well as The Lord of the Rings Movies.**

 **Enjoy and review. Those of you who read the Original, tell me if I did good on the changes. Thank you.**

It was over. He did it. Kirito beat Sword Art Online and its psycho creator, Kayaba Akihiko. But not without a cost. 5,959 people, most of them children, were dead.

Among them, Kazuto Kirigaya and Asuna Yuuki, known by the players of S.A.O as Kirito and Asuna; a pair of players who were a literal power couple, though many would always wonder why Asuna entered a relationship with someone like Kirito, who had always been reclusive and horrible with social skills.

 **(Sorry, I'm still gonna degrade Kirito and Asuna to Official Relationship rather than Married. I think it flows better than them marrying so soon at the ages they are combined with the pacing of the story. Did anyone else think it was a little rushed? I honestly think the Aincrad Arc should have been longer.)**

But their love was true. Asuna, seeing Kirito about to be killed after his sword, the Dark Repulsor broken, overcame the paralysis that had been holding her digital avatar to the floor. Heathcliff's – no, Kayaba's blade, charged red with energy, slashed through her body and drained her HP bar to zero.

It may not have been obvious right then and there, but Kayaba didn't stand a chance, especially after he had the gall to be amused by the anomaly.

The other reason Kayaba's downfall was imminent wasn't obvious was likely the fact that his sword was inserted in Kirito's chest and his HP bar depleted to 0 within seconds.

People would say that it was through sheer force of will, stubbornness, anger and god's will that Kirito's ghostly avatar suddenly came back –eyes glowing _gold_ – to plunge Asuna's rapier into Kayaba's chest.

Klein, having carried a certain item around in his pocket since the first Christmas in the game, was content to let them think that. He was too angry when Kirito's avatar reformed around the sword in his chest, leaving him only enough time to drain Akihiko's HP before he once again shattered.

The remaining players trapped in S.A.O were freed on November 7th, at 2:55 P.M, back into the real world.

Well…all but 300 players that is.

We all know that iconic last scene, with Kirito and his Girlfriend, whom he fully intended on marrying someday, sat on the outside of the Castle Aincrad, watching it dissolve into nothing as the S.A.O server deleted. Kayaba unable to give them a good explanation as to _why_ before he vanished. So they just sat together and cried, having told each other their real names long ago, and exchanged promises to find each other wherever they ended up.

And then their time came. The S.A.O finished deleting. Kirito and Asuna fully expected to wake up and die as they vanished along with the death game.

" _And so, the next story begins."_

Kirito's 3rd Person POV:

Kirito groaned. When did he black out? The last thing he remembered was an explosion of white, and now he woke up his head feeling very fuzzy and small phantom pains stung his head here and there. He tried to open his eyes, but his eyelids seemed to be far too heavy at the moment.

" _So,"_ he contemplated, keeping his eyes closed, _"Real life or afterlife?"_

After a moment, the weight on his eyelids finally lightened and the first thing Kirito saw was a dark starry sky, complete with a full moon, the patterns of which were refreshingly different that the not-entirely-realistic "skies" in Sword Art Online.

The second thing he noticed was his full HP bar.

Wait? His HP bar?

Kirito sat up in alarm, but instantly regretted so as his vision suddenly gained black spots. Luckily they cleared quickly. But back to the matter at hand.

What the hell was his HP bar still doing there…and what was wrong with it. The edge of the bar was constantly fluctuating what seemed like one or two points, and his both his Level and exact HP number markers were gone.

He looked around him. Kirito seemed to be sitting on some kind of rocky plains, in the middle of the night, near what seemed to be the abandoned ruins of a watchtower. What was he doing here? This couldn't still be Aincrad, it was deleted and none of the Levels looked like this. And if he was home, he expected to be in a hospital with no HP bar in the corner of his vision…and Kirito wasn't sure if he'd call whatever this place was the afterlife, and even if it was, having an HP bar, aka a literal Life Line, wouldn't make sense in heaven or hell or wherever he would (had?) ended up.

He was also still wearing the gear he was at the end of S.A.O, with his black Demon Blade strapped onto his back, though Dark Repulsor was nowhere in sight.

But like….why? This didn't make sense?

Out of pure curiosity, he swiped his hand down in a familiar gesture, and sure enough, his Game Menu appeared before him, giving off a faint white glow as always.

"Damn it," Kirito muttered hopelessly.

How did he end up in another game? A moment of panic settled in as the idea that Kayaba Akihiko had set up a backup net game for when S.A.O was completed. But why would the menu be so different then? Several of the options were gone entirely, like all the player communications or interactions like trade requests, duel challenges, and guild and party requests, the icons saying how much gold and EXP he had, and several others. There was no title in the Game Title slot nor any credit pages.

Kirito felt his hopes rise when the Power Control option, where the Log Out button normally resided, was still there. Said hopes were quickly atomic bomb level obliterated when the menu opened all there was within was only a window with a message containing some curly writing in a language Kirito had never seen before. Must be some kind of extra in-game you-must-learn-separate-because-its-not-common-lounge language (or just gibberish) because it wasn't showing up in Japanese or even English characters.

Great.

There better be a Common Tounge in this game.

Kirito, hoping to find something of use, kept scrolling through his menu. His inventory was almost empty except for a few food items, a spare backup dagger Asuna got from a monster drop forever ago, four red healing crystals…a set of 5 throwing needle-like knives…and….his Dark Repulsor sword?

But that blade broke? It should have shattered into polygons and disappeared. He selected it and brought it out. It appeared in his hand, well, part of it anyway. The blade was still broken. Even more so than he remembered. It was almost completely shattered into pieces, but only the tip had broken off when he fought Kayaba… wait most of the pieces were uniform polygon shaped…that didn't make sense.

He put it back in his inventory. Now was not the time.

He had to figure out what was going on. Kirito turned towards the ruined watchtower. Maybe a better view would provide some light on what he should do.

But as soon as he had taken a single step, a sword wrapped around him from behind and poised itself to slit his throat if he so much as breathed the wrong way.

-Not Long Ago-

Asuna was pissed.

S.A.O had been hell enough with all the shit they had to deal with in there. Dying was horrible and then while her last moments had been rather nice, if bittersweet, sitting with Kazuto as they watched Aincrad disintegrate, the wonder of what would happen next, die or wake up a living skeleton in the hospital, was torture in her mind.

And now she was here. She wasn't dead and she wasn't free. She was locked in a bird cage, her avatar changed to have weird transparent white wing things and weird long pointy ears and rather…revealing clothes, and no access to her Game Menu.

She knew she was in a game. Her captor had informed her of that. In fact, he even confirmed it and said that he was the reason why. Unfortunately she knew him IRL, an idiotic, and very perverted man named Sugou Nobuyuki (currently insisting on being called the Fairy King Oberon) who had an annoying god complex and was after her hand in marriage for her "beautiful looks" and parents' money.

Apparently "all" she had to do to be set free of her cage was agree to marry him IRL, until then she would remain in this cage as he tried (and failed) to make her develop Stockholm Syndrome. ("Never in a million years," she snapped, then slapped his face when he had suggestively run his hand down her half bare back.)

And worst of all, Kazuto couldn't help her. Sugou made sure of that, imprisoning Kirito, as well as 299 other players (some of which she probably knew), all unconscious Sword Art Online players, within the Alfheim Online mainframe, planning on doing mental experiments on them.

He told her to just give up on Kirito. She could leave, (the 'if she gave up all IRL freedoms to him' went unsaid) but Kirito was a lost cause. No one was coming to save her. (No one but Sugou of course.)

So, it was up to her to kick this asshole's ass and free herself and the others.

After all, Asuna was no damsel in distress. She saved other people. Hell, Kirito would have been dead about ten times over if it weren't for her.

Luckily, "Fairy King Oberon" was an idiot. A power hungry game master, but an idiot nevertheless. Honestly who puts a pin pad _inside_ the cage when he could just use his Game Master to literally make any other kind of door, or hell just even just get rid of the door completely and just use his Game Master Privileges to jump in and out of the cage?

And then top it all off with a mirror on the bed frame directly in front of the door?

Wow.

So, after pretending to sulk on the bed (well, she didn't really have to pretend) after one of Sugou's annoying daily visits, she watched him punch in the code from the mirror. Once the Night Cycle began, she walked over, punched in the code and found herself outside of the annoying ass bird cage.

An hour of wandering around the area, she found the virtual lab where all the still digitized captive minds of the trapped S.A.O players were being kept.

Fairy King Oberon was about to be over thrown.

Looking through the roster of players, Asuna was very angry to find that many of the people on the list were those who had been in the Floor 75 boss fight, including both Klein and Ageil. She recognized several of the players. Lisbeth was there as well as Silica, who still had her mini-dragon familiar, Pina, attached to her player ID. Then Asuna's blood boiled upon seeing that some of the people on the list were little-little kids who had been staying on the first floor for protection.

And to make things even worse, he was hurting them. All of them, sending waves of shocks and pain into their brain. He could kill them if this went on too long, or at the very least ruin their brain to the point of either insanity or to a vegetable state.

And of course, at the very bottom of the list was Kirito, who seemed to be getting a little more stimulus that many of the others.

Asuna looked at his name longingly.

"We promised to find each other no matter what," she said softly and got to work figuring out how to get them all out. Asuna may not have meen a computer nerd in the past, but two years of SAO menu workings, she had a little more of an idea and begun searching through all the options on the console.

Just as she figured out how to free them, she literally had the release button on the screen, she was interrupted.

"Hey! Grab her!" someone yelled. But this was a girl who had just spent two years fighting for her life and fighting monsters, two scientist with slow slug like monster avatars were nothing against her.

However, she did have to dodge the incoming tentacle-like arms, which unfortunately put her further away from the computer.

"Hey now, come here girly. We're not going to hurt you," the fact that the scientist's leery voice came from a tentacle monsters avatar made it even more disgusting.

"Boss is logged out on business. Catch her and then we'll see what he wants us to do," the other said.

They lashed their expendable tentacles at her once again, but Asuna dodged. Fighting them was just like fighting that Plant Boss Monster from Floor 35.

 **(Okay so I don't actually know all the boss monsters, so about 99% of the time, any time I reference an SAO boss monsters, it's a random and probably not canon)**

Though, this would be so much easier if she had a sword to slash at the tentacles with. Unfortunately, she still couldn't seem to bring her Game Menu up. She was weaponless and all she could do for now was dodge and hope she didn't get snagged.

Wait…maybe she did have a weapon. She touched her ears. The top of them had a metal jewelry like piece, that was a bit pointed due to the shape of her avatar. IF looked at from far away, they looked like small throwing daggers.

Obviously, Asuna knew that since this was a game, she couldn't actually use her strange top of ear things as weapons. She wasn't even sure if the scientists had HP bars up here in a no-players zone. But if she could just get close enough to the computer, then use the earrings to make it seem like she had a weapon, it just might work to make them flinch.

Asuna went for it. She ran around the white consoles containing the brains of the players and eventually came up behind the main control counsel.

"There she is!" one of the scientists yelled.

Asuna made it look like she pressed a button on the computer and then brought up her pointed ear topping earring things into each hand.

"How did she access the weapon data!?" one scientists freaked.

Before they could process that she couldn't actually hurt them with even if she had actually weapons, she threw the earrings, her aim straight for their eyes. Just like she hoped. They flinched.

Asuna typed as fast as she could on the monitor.

"WHAT'S GOING ON HERE!" the horrid sound of Fairy King Oberon's voice boomed in the lab.

"O-oberon!" the scientists stumbled. For once, the pervert's precense was actually a plus for Asuna, giving her a few more seconds. Just enough. However, she realized that she couldn't Log off All the captured players at the same time, probably a failsafe made by Oberon. But she could highlight a few to take them with her.

So she chose the team she knew could help her get the others out later if worst came to worst.

She slammed her hand on the Log Out Button.

Just as Oberon slammed the Freeze Game button. But it was too late.

As all this happened, the faint almost angelic sound of another unknown language began whispering through control room.

Asuna disappeared from the ALO control center.

Along with 5 of the captured player's minds.

However, later on when Sugou rushed to try and intercept Asuna, who was supposed to be awake IRL, he found her still in a coma.

….

….

….

Asuna was still pissed.

She escaped Alfheim Online, so eager to get back to the real world and get that pervert behind bars and see to Kirito again, but found herself waking up in an unfamiliar place.

Again.

Well… at least this time she wasn't stuck in a bird cage with a pervert. And her game menu was back to functioning, if a bit…reconfigured…and missing a few important parts.

And as another plus, she was no longer wearing whatever the hell it was the Oberon put her in. Her familiar white and red SAO gear felt comfortable, being a million times better than the fancy practically underwear she'd been wearing before and her Rapier was comforting weight at her side.

"Asuna?" a shocked, relived and confused voice said from behind her said. She turned around, and to her relief, it was a friend.

"Klein," Asuna said, grateful at the sight of the red haired samurai, who was also clad in his S.A.O gear.

"Y-you're alive! It worked for you too- ! …. where are we? Kirito beat Kayaba after you…well - and the announcement said the game was over, but I still see HP bars and this is not a hospital," he said.

"I'm not sure what's going on. Wait, so the last thing you remember was the game ending?"

"Yeah, that's the last thing that happened before I blanked out so…."

Asuna silently thanked whatever gods were out there. Klein didn't seem to have any memory of being trapped in the ALO lab, being tortured, so hopefully no one else would either. She'd take them having three weeks of blank memory over them remembering what happened to them in there any day.

Asuna was just about to say that they should get moving and figure out where they were when they suddenly heard a gasp from behind them.

Klein and Asuna turned around to see a woman with long blonde hair and fair skin, wearing an almost medieval maiden style dress, starring at them. There was no indication the woman was an NPC, Player or Quest giver.

Then and there, Asuna realized that just because S.A.O was defeated and Alfheim was escaped from, that their lives weren't going to get any simpler any time soon.

…

…..

…..

Andrew aka Ageil was confused. One moment, he'd been almost to tears over the apparent deaths of his friends, Kirito and Asuna, the next the game was ending, and now he was waking up without having any memory of falling unconscious, and now there was a little blue feather dragon standing on his chest nudging his face, though he was only briefly able to see if before his eyes became too heavy to keep open.

"And what is a little girl doing, wandering the halls of the Palace of Gondor?" he heard a voice, not talking to him, but to someone else.

"I-I don't know," an obviously young girl's rather nervous voice replied, "But my friend has been unconscious for the last five minutes and my other friend, Pina can't get him to wake up."

Wait, he knew that voice. That was Silica. He had been helping her level up, just barley getting her from intermediate to the lower end of the high ranks of players' right before he got called to go help with the Level 75 boss monster.

 **(No, I'm not shipping the 28 year old Ageil with the only 14 by the end of the Aincrad Arc Silica. He's just a cool older bro/Imma teach you to be a badass little girl type dude.)**

His eyes still felt far too heavy to open, but he sensed someone kneel down next to him and place a hand on his forehead, thought it was quite wary of the little blue creature, whom Ageil now remembered as Pina, the heath regenerating Dragon, who had moved to sit next to his arm.

"Wake. No harm is currently going to come to you," the man's voice said.

Oh yeah, that was reassuring. But Ageil supposed it probably wouldn't be too good an idea to leave Silica to deal with the situation by herself. He tried to open his eyes, it took a while and was pretty hard but he got there. Standing over him was a man with semi-curly brown hair, roughly Ageil's age. He starred at Ageil critically with little trust, though he didn't seem currently hostile.

"My name is Faramir, son of the Steward of Gondor. I will have your name and how you got into the Palace of Minas Tirith," the man stated.

Ageil and Silica shared a look. What in the world was going on?

 **(More of the others later, but the first movie does mostly Focus on the Fellowship, Frodo and Aragorn, so…)**

STRIDER 3rd PERSON POV

It was strange, seeing a lone boy out on the Weathertop hill, so close to the remains of the Amon Sul watchtower, especially considering the precious item that was currently hiding out there under the watchful (ish) eye of a hobbit, whom had very little self-defense skills.

Strider had just been on his way back from his scouting. Trying to decipher how far or close his pursuers where when he suddenly saw the boy, sitting on the ground, frowning and looking around his surroundings.

The child, who could be no more than 15 or 16 was strange in other ways as well. He wore strange clothing, mostly black but had white trim on it, and while the boy looked moderately comfortable in it, the clothing clearly wasn't well worn, nor did it seem extremely new. He also had a sword on his back, a one handed long sword by the look of it, but that required quite the strength to use and the boy didn't look particularly muscled.

He also looked strange. He was of an ethnicity that Strider could not seem to place, which was strange considering that he had been to most every corner of Middle Earth and met several races, yet this boy fell into none of them. He had black hair, cut short like the length of most male hobbits, but lacked any curls. His eyes were onyx, not dark brown, the darkest Strider had ever seen on someone of his own race.

And then there was the strange glowing…thing that had appeared in front of him a moment ago that seemed to manipulate when the boy touched it. Then there was the shattered greenish sword that had momentarily appeared only to disappear moments later after the boy had briefly examined it.

But how in the name of Eru did he get out here? He carried no packs for food, water or other provisions, literally nothing but his clothes and his sword. He didn't look tired, starved, dehydrated or even like he had been outside traveling at all, yet the nearest town he could have come from, Bree, was an 8 day journey though the wilderness, but he couldn't have come from there, as that's where Strider and the Hobbits had come from and he'd seen no signs of other travelers.

The boy also seemed confused.

There were Nazgul about, but the boy didn't seem to be afraid, which meant he was either ignorant of their existence or was stupidly undermining them… Aragorn was thinking more the former than the latter.

But he could be wrong. Perhaps the boy ended up here through some sorcery, or maybe it was magic that made him seem perfectly composed and healthy to make him appear as though he hadn't been traveling or perhaps he had a fraction of elf blood somewhere in his veins. Rare but not unheard of.

But when he turned towards the watchtower, weather he be enemy or innocent, Strider couldn't just let him wander without interrogation. Strider used his skills to get extremely close to the boy without detection, and drew his sword and placed it at his neck before he had time to react.

He prevented the boy from drawing his sword by grabbing his wrist and was surprised at the force of his resistance, but the blade he pointed at him (somewhat reluctantly. It was a child after all) kept him from having enough range of motion to effectively fight back and break free.

"What is a boy doing on the plains of Weathertop alone," Strider said to the boy.

He continued to struggle as much as he could without getting his neck cut. Of course, Strider wasn't planning on hurting him, but he needed to know if he was an enemy right now.

"Depends on what you're doing out here alone," the boy finally replied.

"Do not play games, boy," Strider chided.

"Don't call me boy. Either way, most people tend to be a bit friendlier when there's not a sharp blade so close to their neck," the boy snapped with a tinge of sarcasm.

Well…he didn't exactly seem like the type of person working for the enemy…he seemed to be very foreign. Strider decided that maybe a different approach would be more suiting.

He lowered his sword from the boy's neck and released his wrist. Predictably, the boy took several steps away from Strider, his hand how resting on the handle of his sword, ready to draw it should the need arise as he examined Strider up and down carefully.

For someone so young though, he appeared to be a lot calmer than anyone else who just got threatened with a sword by a stranger. That left the question: stupidity or experience?

It honestly seemed more like the later the more Strider examined the strange boy before him. He was tense, but hid the majority of it quite well, like he was used to being attacked. His eyes never left Strider and he examined him carefully for threats.

"So, who are you?" the boy asked.

Strider waited for only a moment before giving his ranger name, "I am known as Strider. A Ranger of the North."

The words, luckily, didn't seem to draw out any recognition from the boy, which meant he likely wasn't there tracking him or the Hobbits, which far lessened his chances of working for the enemy.

"I have given you my name, and would you give me one in return?" Strider asked the boy when he did not reply.

"Kirito," he said simply. The boy seemed to relax, though to Strider's trained eye, the boy was ready to draw his sword and fight at a moment's notice. It seemed to be a very practiced stance. Slightly concerning for someone so young. He also wasn't any closer to deciphering the culture of the boy based on the name, for like his physical looks, was foreign in origin.

But as much as Strider wanted to stay here and continue trying to figure the boy out, he realized that he had been away from Frodo and the other Hobbits for far too long. He needed to get back to them before something bad happened. Knowing Merry and Pippin, they were very likely to cause some trouble unless Strider was there to supervise them.

It was only a matter of time until-!

Strider's train of thought was cut short as a shrill screech filled the air. The boy, Kirito, was instantly on alert but didn't visibly jump out of his skin as most children would. It appeared Kirito did not know the danger of the Nazgul because he was not nearly as afraid as he should be.

However, Strider no longer had time to worry about Kirito and his strangeness.

The Ranger took off running towards the watchtower. He had to protect Frodo and the Ring from falling. Strider practically flew up the stairs of the tower, only vaguely noticing the abandoned packs on the ground from where the Hobbits had set up camp and the remains of a still smoking fire that should have never been lit.

He had just reached the top of the tower, where the Hobbits had fled to when he heard Frodo's scream. Merry, Pippin and Sam had been tossed to the side and seemed dazed from hitting their heads on the rocks. Frodo was nowhere in sight, but the five present Wraiths were gathered around an empty path on the ground, one of which had their sword pointed down as if stabbing something, which could only mean Frodo had put that damned ring on his finger.

Torch in one hand and sword in the other, he charged into battle. He knew he couldn't beat these things, but he had to drive them off, just enough to get Frodo and other the Hobbits back on their feet and running as fast as their tiny legs could carry them to Rivendell.

Strider slashed his sword at the nearest Wraith then followed by waiving his flaming torch at them. They didn't necessarily fear fire nor would it kill them, but it would slightly weaken and drive them back for a short time.

Rushing into battle against five of the nine Nazgul was foolhardy, but the Ranger had no other choice as he was all that stood between them and the now visible Frodo who screamed in pain. Sam went to his aid as Strider continued to block and parry the swords of the enemy.

He raised his sword to block one's strike and his arm bearing a torch was busy fending off another. But that left his chest wide open to an attack from a third. Strider knew he would not be able to block properly in time, and even a small scratch from one of _their_ blades could cause major problems, both mentally and physically. Strider could only imagine what Frodo could be feeling at the moment.

But just before Strider was to be cut down, a dark figure was suddenly in front of him. Kirito, with his black coat still swaying from the speed of his movements had raised his sword, which was forged from a metal that was as black as Kirito's hair, eyes and clothing, and stood solidly blocking the Wraith's attack.

Was that a smirk on his face? Strider only thought he saw it for a moment before time started up again and the battle commenced.

Kirito was a surprisingly good swordsman, fast despite the obvious weight of his sword. Strider didn't know many people, let alone children, who would attack the Nazgul head on _and_ not die within moments of doing so. Strider would have done a full analysis of Kirito's fighting style in hopes of figuring out more about the strange boy if Strider wasn't also a person who just rushed in to take the Nazgul head on.

Kirito seemed to mostly keep to himself while fighting, but there were a few moments where Kirito would insert himself into Strider's attack to work with him and create a powerful combo attack that pushed one of the Nazgul over the edge of the tower.

Strider parried another strike, pushed the deadly foe's sword away and lashed out with the torch, lighting the creature on fire. It screamed it's terrible scream and fled. Kirito picked up on the tatic and begun positioning himself so one of the three remaining Nazgul had it's back to Strider. Then using a series of insanely strong blows, several of which his sword _glowed blue or green_ pushed the creature backwards straight into the torch. As the one before, it screamed and fled over the side of the tower.

Two left.

Strider dispatched one of them on his own, using a set of rapid strikes and blocks with both sword and torch. It was a hard fought match, and several times the Ranger was nearly defeated, but it was gratifying when the Nazgul fled with it's body aflame.

Kirito seemed to be having a little trouble with the final Nazgul, who Strider realized was the Witch King Angmar…the leader of the Nazgul. He would not be easily taken down, more so than its brethren.

Strider ran and struck the creature with his sword, but Angmar was too quick, parying his blow. Strider and the boy rapidity kept striking at the Nazgul, but it had the advantage of being inhumanly fast and strong, parrying every blow.

" _Just a little faster,"_ Strider heard Kirto mutter to himself, clearly not speaking to him, but formulating a plan for himself. The speed of Kirito's attacks increased, and with his swords glowing the way they were, leaving trails of light from moving so quickly, it would be difficult for a normal person to see exactly where Kirito's sword was.

Strider noticed that the Witch King now paid more attention to the child. That gave Stider his chance, and be backed a few steps away from the clash of swords, leaving Kirito to hold the creatures attention with his ever increasing speed of attacks.

When the positioning was just right, with Kirito at an out of the way angle and the Witch King near the edge, it's sword busy parrying Kirito's blows, Strider threw the torch with as much strength as he could muster. It stuck in the creature's back, his entire body went up in flames as if he was covered in oil, and he fled into the night.

….

POV KIRITO

Kirito's arms dropped in exhaustion, he barely had enough strength in his arms to life them and put his sword back in its sheath.

It seemed that whatever game it was in now was going to tax his energy more than in SAO for using the special combination moves or strength increasing abilities that made his sword glow. But it was necessary. Those black robbed guys were as hard to drive off as it was to beat a boss monster and they didn't even kill them.

Kirito's attention was once again captured when the man, Strider, put his sword away and walked over to the barefooted midgets, one of which had a bleeding shoulder where he'd been stabbed.

"Help him Strider," one of the other curly haired midged said urgently.

Strider picked up the blade that one of the creatures had dropped.

"He has been stabbed by a Morgul Blade. A pice has broken off inside the wound," the sword suddenly dissolved into ash, Strider threw the hilt away in disgust, "This is beyond my ability to heal, he needs elvish medicine. Follow me. All of you."

The last statement was aimed directly at Kirito, leaving no room for argument and Strider picked the wounded one up in his arms and begun running, off towards a tree line, three hobbits and Kirito in tow.

 **Chapter 1 complete. Tell me what you think. It's way better and has a lot more substance than the first time around writing it. Review and tell me what you thought.**


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